Jake Kung Fu Panda

I'm at my wits end trying to figure out how to get a video posted to this blog, without it freezing towards the end of downloading it. So I've caved in and joined the YouTube crowd in hopes that this will actually work. So here is the explanation of the video. We took the kids to see Kung Fu Panda when it first came out in theaters. First off, its a cute movie, one that Santa will be leaving at our house for Christmas. Jake really took to this movie and now, if you ask him to show you his kung Fu, he'll do a little heya and kick his leg. So that is the video. As you can see when you watch it, he wasn't wanting to perform, you wouldn't either if your mom was in your face with the camera two minutes after waking up in the morning. Sorry Jake. Anyway, he'll also do a hulk smash, or as he calls it, mash. Anyway, lets hope this works thing time. Enjoy!

Painting our Pumpkins

Since we purchased our pumpkins over the weekend, Tyson felt it would only be an appropriate family night activity to decorate them. Jake wanted to paint his to be elmo, but I don't think he knew quite how to translate that thought onto the pumpkin itself. So we got the same end result we do when he colors with crayons...scribbles. But Tyson had fun painting the other side of Jakes pumpkin when he decided he was finished. That time came when I said I was putting Jefferson in the bath. Jake decided to jump in the bath as well. Nevermind the fact that he'd had a bath right before our little activity. The kids loves getting in the bath. If you just mention the word bath, he has his clothes and diaper off before you realise what just happened.
Anyway, so here are a few pictures of our finished products.
Jake telling us he wants to paint elmo
Tyler informing us of her ideas to decorate. Everything had to do with some princess theme.
Tanner posing in dads work shirt...he wore holes in the elbows this last week so Tanner was more than happy to sport it for an art shirt.
Everybody say cheese!
Jake painting Elmo...or something trying to resemble elmo.
Tanner starting his pumpkins face.
Tyler's "princess". It has gold glitter paint so that quilifies it as princess, right?
Jefferson hanging out watching everybody paint. I promise he doesn't live in his bouncer seat, but he does like his seat.
The finished product. The little center one is Jakes elmo.
The finished product again, this time with the center one sporting Tyson's paint job. Its on Jakes pumpkin, just on the other side. Tyson decided to show Jake what he painted on the other side of his pumpkin. To that, Jake said No! Tyson then turned the pumpkin around to Jakes side and to that Jake yelled, Yeah!

Good bye off track

Well, we managed to make it through our three weeks of being off track, and nobody was too badly beaten. Just kidding, no one was beaten, but its not to say the thought didn't cross my mind a few times. I have to say, I owe Tanner and Tyler's teachers a HUGE thank you for taking them five days a week, most of the time, from 8:30-4:15. I don't know how some people do home school. I guess they are just better than I am. Three days into their break, Jefferson was old enough to finally be able to go to the gym's daycare, so that helped save my sanity. I'm back to going three days a week and it is SO nice. I don't know why I didn't find this help earlier. We didn't do much while they were off track because I'll be honest, it's just too hard to get everyone on the same page with four kids and one adult. By the time I have everyone ready, Jefferson is hungry and needing a nap. Once I get him fed (he can sleep in the car and more often than not, usually does), then everyone else is either wanting a meal or its snack time, then Jefferson is ready for something and its just a never ending cycle.
Anyway, with my mom being in Germany for the first half, we didn't do much. So once she got back, we decided it was time to take the kids for a field trip. My grandpa has been sick lately, so we decided to go and spend the day with grandma and grandpa great. Well, seeing as Jake would need a nap, we decided to leave for the hour and a half car ride, right around when he should be taking a nap. Key word: Should. He has gone three weeks now without a nap, and I'm not happy about it. Well, to test and see if he really truly is done with naps, we got in the car at 12:30. We drove the entire way and he didn't even get drousy. Well, that blew that plan. He's still at the point though, that if I go anywhere after 4pm, he's out in two seconds, which then messes up bedtime and its downhill from there. That's what ended up happening. So we spent Wednesday with my grandparents. Grandpa Great fell asleep before we could get any pictures with him.
Jefferson sitting in a Bumbo. He tolerates this seat. He's actually sitting in it happy a little longer each time. I think he likes being able to sit up and see.

Tanner and Tyler emptying the dishwasher. Their new job being off track. Jake likes to help as well.


So Jake has this terrible habit of coming in to our bed at night. We're so tired, most the time we aren't even awake enough to realise he's come in to our bed. This is one morning I guess he decided it was too bright in the room so burried himself in the pillows. He is really asleep in this picture.
Tanner riding grandma greats stationary bike.
Jake on the mini trampoline. The bike and tramp kept the three of them happy and busy the entire time.
Jake and Grandma Great.
Tanner and Grandma Great.
Tyler and Grandma Great
Jefferson and Grandma Great

Today, Tyson decided we would have a fun day since they would be going back to school on Monday. He decided he wouldn't even tell me what he had in mind. I did end up having a say in what we did though. He's been stuck on going to a pumpkin patch, so we did that first. We started this adventure at 3:30, and wouldn't you know, Jake fell asleep in the car. So Tanner and Tyler picked out a pumpkin for each of them. And we took a few pictures with Jefferson standing in some of the heads. After that, we decided to go to dinner at the Mayan. They've changed their menu and it actually wasn't too bad. Its not someplace I would go often, but it wasn't too bad. The kids enjoyed the divers and we got a few pictures of that as well. We were going to try classic skating after that, but we decided against that, just because the kids aren't old enough to be able to do that without our help and Jake would require too much assistance as well and neither one of us trusted our skills to hold Jefferson at the same time. So we decided to go to WalMart and get ice cream and rent a movie from RedBox. I think the kids had a good time and will hopefully remember this as a good time off track. We'll see what happens.

Tanner, Tyler and Jefferson at the pumpkin patch
Fun at the Mayan


Jake at the Mayan
Tyler at the Mayan
Tanner at the Mayan
Outside the Mayan. Sorry Jefferson about the toys in your face!!

And last but not least, Jefferson asleep. I know random picture, but I have to say, out of four children, he is the only one that will not take a binki and won't take a bottle. However, he is the only child that is turning out to be a thumb sucker. I love it!! I sucked my thumb when I was little and its something that I've tried to get all of my kids to do, to no avail. So, needless to say, I was a little happy when I saw him completely asleep with his thumb in his mouth!

Baby Gage!!

New addition to the Tarin Family! In picture:Danny, Cymony, Micah and Baby Gage
Well, the long awaited arrival of my sisters baby, has come and gone, and this is the first time I've seen any pictures of him at all. I finally got into a family website that actually had pictures of him on it. Gage Arron Tarin came into this world September 27 at 11:32am. He weighed in at 7lbs 12 oz and 20.5 inches long. He had been home for a day and needed to go back into the hospital for an infection due to a little procedure he had done, but all are well now and he's hom and changing everybody's lifes. My mom had made it to Germany the day before Cymony went into labor and my dad made it to her house the morning she went into the hospital. Congratulations!! We are so excited to meet this little guy, although he probably won't be so little when we do meet him, seeing as he is half way around the world. Good thing for skype!!

My sister Cymony and baby Gage.

Today, I Marry my Best Friend

...Ok, well eight years ago today. Who would have ever thought I'd be where I am now! Tyson is everything I could ask for. Caring, gentle, understanding, supportive, kind, thoughtful, hard working. He spoils me to no end, but keeps me in check so it doesn't go to my head. I feel that we both share the family responsibilities equally, although he would probably disagree, because he seems to brush all three of the kids teeth, every night. I can't help that they prefer him to me. :) Anyway, I just wanted to let Tyson know how much I love and appreciate him and wouldn't trade him for anything. Is that sappy enough for ya?

p.s. sorry the picture isn't the best quality. I don't have them saved to an electronic file, so I had to take a picture of the picture. Oh well.

BYU Bi-weeks!

All I have to say is thank goodness BYU has some Saturdays they don't play. Not that I don't thoroughly enjoy watching football, I really do, but its nice to have an entire day to be able to stay focused on little...or not so little projects. At the beginning of the summer, we had someone offer to finish the other side of our basement. Well, we were hesitant because we weren't really looking to finish it, but since starting my coupon savings, our food storage has really picked up, so we decided to let him finish a storage room. Well, things happened and it didn't get finished...until today. Thanks to my wonderful, loving, patient husband who finished this little room that will make a HUGE difference to organizing my food storage and keeping things out of the way. So these pictures are what we spent our bi-week from football doing. Happy day!!

-k- well, this isn't of the basement. This was my "junk" cupboard. We couldn't find ANYTHING in this cupboard before I blew it up and started over. Now I have more room than I know what to do with. I'm sure it won't take too long to figure it out though. It never does. :)

This is the finished side of the basement after we unloaded all three shelving units to be able to move them into the new storage room. What a mess!!

More of that same mess!

Not completely cleaned up, but we're getting there.

My wonderful storage room!!

More storage room and food! Do you think we have enough cereal?

The other side of the storage room.

My very exhausted husband after a hard day of manual labor.

Who would have ever thought I'd be so excited for a storage room!??!?

Serviving another crazy week!

We made it through another week. This week wasn't so bad, Saturday we actually had some breathing room. I actually got my grocery shopping done on Saturday instead of having to wait until Monday. I don't mind shopping on Monday's but its a lot better to only have the baby with me. We actually went to bed last night to a very clean house. The only thing that didn't get done, was folding the laundry, which takes its own precious time to get done. I HATE folding laundry, it seriously is the bane of my existence!! If anyone wants to torture me, just put me in front of an endless line of laundry needing to be folded!!
Right now we are on the count down to the kids being off track.
Yes, we have one week of school left before three weeks of craziness.
And I'm not quite sure how I'm going to get anything done with four kids home.
Not that I don't love my kids, but it sure is a lot easier to run errands when I only have Jake and Jefferson. The good news...Jefferson will be three months on the 4th, so I'll be able to take all of the kids to the gym! Happy Day!! And long overdue. I never thought I'd get to the point in my life where I would miss working out so much. I'm just going to have to hope that Jefferson can handle being with the daycare for two hours. We'll see how he does.
Friday night, Tyson spoiled me and took me on a date that was focused 100% on the things I would enjoy. We went to Body Worlds. Let me just tell you, it was amazing! After that we went to dinner at this very good and very expensive restaurant. Flemming's Steak House. Mmmm Good. He had a gift certificate given to him at Christmas last year and he wanted to keep going while I was pregnant, but I told him I wanted to wait so I could actually eat the food and enjoy it. And that we did! It wasn't a cheap night, but very worth it.
Anyway, I'm posting some random pictures. Mostly just Jefferson, because he's getting so big! I pulled the saucer up from the basement and while he sits in it fine, he really just tolerates it at this point. He's still a little wobbly to really enjoy it and doesn't quite know what to do with the toys. He'll grow into it thought.


I'm not quite sure what Tyler and Jake were doing, but I do know they wanted in on the pictures as well. Jake loves that Jefferson is on his level while in this little toy.

Check out the chunky arms!!

Jefferson has discovered his hands and they are always in his mouth now!